Tim Frost was exactly right to highlight the underutilized health care resource of community pharmacists in his Feb. 12 op-ed, “A solution to the doctor shortage could be just down the street.”
Yet, importantly, Medicare beneficiaries aren’t covered when services are provided by pharmacists. These policies leave patients without access to the care that pharmacists are more than capable of providing, both in communities and in our nations 6,100 hospitals and clinics where pharmacists also practice.
Modernizing outdated laws and recognizing pharmacists as providers under Medicare and in state regulations are practical steps to strengthen care, improve safety and reduce unnecessary health care costs — all while alleviating extreme stress on the rest of the clinician workforce.
Douglas J. Scheckelhoff, Bethesda
The writer is interim executive vice president and CEO of the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists.
Tim Frost suggested that pharmacists could prescribe certain medicines to lighten the workload for an insufficient number of physicians. Frost has clearly not stood in line at my understaffed Walgreens. The pharmacists are too busy to answer questions, let alone diagnose and treat ailments.
Judith Nierman, Rockville
An effective myopia therapyis already available
As a fellow pediatric ophthalmologist, I share David G. Hunter’s frustration with barriers to effective myopia control. However, his Feb. 14 op-ed, “This drug treats myopia. I’m sick of telling patients they can’t have it.,” might leave readers with the mistaken impression that safe, effective and affordable atropine therapy is unavailable to U.S. patients today.
In reality, the proprietary atropine formulation submitted by Sydnexis to the Food and Drug Administration does not include the more effective 0.05 percent concentration — a formulation shown in randomized clinical trials to be highly effective and already widely used in clinical practice safely through regulated compounding pharmacies. My own patients routinely obtain compounded atropine, including 0.05 percent. These treatments are accessible and affordable, and have an extensive safety record.
Recent randomized clinical trials have also raised questions about the clinical effectiveness of lower-dose atropine. The National Institutes of Health-funded Pediatric Eye Disease Investigator Group trial found no meaningful slowing of axial elongation with 0.01 percent atropine compared with a placebo. By contrast, the landmark Low-Concentration Atropine for Myopia Progression study demonstrated substantially greater efficacy with the 0.05 percent concentration.
Approving proprietary lower-dose formulations that exclude the more effective concentration risks increasing costs without improving patient outcomes. Effective, affordable atropine therapy already exists today.
Stephen R. Glaser, Rockville
The writer is founder of Kids Eye Care of Maryland and is chief of the Pediatric Ophthalmology Section at Holy Cross Hospital and Affiliate of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
University summit isn’t appeasement
In their Feb. 9 online op-ed, “Universities are sending Trump a dangerous message,” Arne Duncan and David Pressman argued that universities that express a willingness to work collaboratively with the federal government to discuss the future of higher education are engaging in “appeasement.” This characterization is misguided.
Efforts like the leadership summit we plan to reconvene in partnership with Vanderbilt University this month are part of an ongoing dialogue among university leaders and other thinkers who are committed to honest discourse about the state of our sector and the steps we need to take to identify opportunities for reform.
In no way is this summit an attempt to “appease” anyone, including the Trump administration. The conversation about eroding trust in higher education pre-dates the 2024 election and even the 2016 election. Gallup has shown a steady decline in confidence in higher education for many years. This moment does not represent an either-or choice between engaging in meaningful dialogue about higher education reform and opposing governmental overreach. We can, and must, do both.
Andrew D. Martin, St. Louis
The writer is chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis.
Belichick isn’t a Hall of Famer
Regarding Jim Geraghty’s Feb. 4 op-ed, “What cost Bill Belichick a chance at the Hall of Fame”:
Thank you, Mr. Geraghty, for being the only voice of sanity about the (supposedly) egregious sin of Bill Belichick not being elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame on his first opportunity. I listen to sports radio, and over and over again I hear what an outrage it was and that it must be punishment for Spygate and Deflategate. But not one time did I hear anyone other than Geraghty say the ugly truth: that without Brady, Belichick had a losing record.
To be specific, in the four years after Brady left New England, the Patriots went 29-38. Before Brady arrived in New England and before he became the starter, they were 5-13. And in Belichick’s tenure as head coach for the Cleveland Browns, the team was 36-44.
Maybe the Hall of Fame voters weren’t actually punishing him for the two “gate” transgressions, but rightfully slowing the roll of what many assumed would be the no-brainer induction of the supposedly greatest NFL coach of all time. Those of us unafraid to exercise our independent critical thinking skills hope this is merely the first small step for an ever-growing obstacle to Belichick’s induction. He should not be in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Jennifer Gittins-Harfst, Annandale
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